McGourty, previously director of comms and public affairs at Energy UK, will lead the comms team as corporate affairs director.

She said the role, one of the first hires under new British Gas managing director Chris Weston, was a reflection of ‘how seriously we take trust’.

Pointing to work that included partnerships with homelessness charity Shelter, she added: ‘The role is to take a more co-ordinated app-roach to external comms.

‘It’s to see how we can tell the story of what we do better. By telling the story of the positive things we do we can go some way towards tackling the issue of trust, which the whole industry is battling with.’